Misadventures in Babysitting
by Jessa L'Rynn
Summary: The Doctor takes Rose and Jack to various places. Trouble has never been so dangerous, nor anywhere near so domestic. Response to Chibi's Now Random Nonsence Challenge.
1. Chapter 1

**_Misadventures in Babysitting_**

_The-Chibis-Are-Stalking-Me issued a challenge to appropriate one of her chapters from her story __What If...__ as a prompt for a new story. So, I did. Probably not any of the ones she expected, let me tell you. Still, fun. Started for a short story. Forty typed pages later, I realized I was going to need chapters. Everything below in bold is hers. The rest is what my demented mind made of it. Please note, I don't own Doctor Who (although I'd never say no to the job). Neither do I own any chibis, which can't help but be a good thing, judging by what they do to our challenge issuer. Neither do I own a leather jacket. Lots of roses, though, but no Tylers. Based on Chapter 61: The Plunny Chapter_

**

* * *

Chapter 1: The First Eight Hours**

**After the ninth time Rose sighed and poked the salad in front of her, the Doctor rolled his eyes and gave in. "What's wrong now?"**

**"Nothing." Rose answered in a too-innocent voice. "Nothing at all."**

**"Then why have you stabbed the poor green things in your bowl into mush?" He raised an eyebrow.**

**Rose shot him a look. "Have not! It's just..."**

**He sighed. "Just what?"**

**"Why are there stemmy pieces?"**

**He blinked at her a few times. "What?"**

**She grinned at him. "Look at the broken record. I said, why are there stemmy pieces? I mean, can't anyone seem to understand that it would make my life so much easier if I didn't have to pick all the little stemmy parts off?"**

**"Rose, I think you shouldn't drink any of that tea your mum sends anymore." The Doctor looked at her cup like it was about to jump up and try to bite him.**

**Rose continued, ignoring him. "I mean, the TARDIS takes the stemmy bits off, so why can't anybody else?"**

**There was a pause.**

**"Ya done?"**

**"Yeah, guess so."**

**"Good." The Doctor leaned back in his seat, watching one of the waiters stroll by. "Now eat your salad."**

"I don't want to," she said, and the Doctor sighed, again. He could just feel a tantrum in the offing, and it was making his teeth itch.

"What part of 'I don't do domestic' was the problem?" he asked the Universe at large. As usual, of course, the Universe ignored him. However, the small blonde girl across from him giggled and stuck her elbow into the salad dressing.

Then she blushed violently red while he tried to pretend he hadn't seen it, though he heard a voice already admonishing her to clean it up, and was surprised to realize it was his own.

There was a tiny tug at the sleeve of his leather jacket. He looked down, trying his best to keep smiling. "Yes?" he said, calmly.

"Doctor, I haveta go to the baffroom."

"You just went to the bathroom ten minutes ago," he replied, now starting to feel quite worried. What were a few dangerous proto-temporal anomalies and the destruction of an entire solar system when compared to this... this abomination?

"But that time was justa wash my hands 'cuz they was dirty. Now I gotta go." Heavy emphasis on the word "go" and some wiggling, dancing maneuvers in the seat indicated exactly how desperate the child was.

The Doctor stood and took his little companion's tiny hand. "Rose, stay right here. I mean it, young lady. If you move from that spot, I'll turn you over my knee when I get back." He walked away from the table, already feeling her huge brown eyes glaring a smoldering hole in the back of his head. He turned in time to catch her mocking him with much rolling of the eyes and little hands on twisting hips. "And don't take over the world, either," he added.

She stuck her tongue out at him.

"Girls are stupid," said his smaller companion, as if announcing a fact.

The Doctor couldn't help the grin. He really, really couldn't. "Sometimes, Jack," the Doctor said, "boys can be even stupider. But we're not supposed to tell them."

"Ohhh," said Jack, as though the Doctor had revealed one of the great secrets of creation to him.

He found that he couldn't be angry or even actually very worried with that tiny, trusting little face beaming so innocently up into his own. Jack, as an adult, made a handsome and useful, if roguish, addition to the TARDIS crew. However, at an age of, by the Doctor's best estimation, approximately six years, he was quite adorable. His small, serious face already showed traces of his adult beauty, but this little Jack was quite shy and remarkably sensible.

Not anywhere near the handful that the approximately thirteen year-old Rose was turning out to be. Not by a long shot. The Doctor rolled his eyes and straightened his jacket.

* * *

But it wasn't their fault. Mostly, it was his. His, and the government scientists on Zurvidea. Some absolute moron among them was convinced he'd discovered the secret to eternal life using limited range time slips. Unfortunately, what the idiot had done was ripped a hole in the Vortex (approximately the size of Belgium) and the TARDIS, responding to the keening distress that only Time Lords and their sentient time machines could feel, had dropped them down without warning or ceremony, expecting them to act to seal the breach.

By the time they'd arrived, though, fully a quarter of the adult population on the solar side had been reduced to dust, including the purported genius who had invented the filthy thing.

No plans, no blue prints, and no time to deal with it, they had split up and made for the center of the anomaly. The Doctor was immune, largely, but, had Jack or Rose been hit by the now destabilized effects, they could have been torn apart. Thankfully, Jack's Vortex Manipulator made an excellent sensor to that sort of thing and the companions were able to make their way inside without harm.

Jack had taken out the protections on the computer while the Doctor was yelling at the remaining scientists and working out the quantum dispersal ratio and temporal sino-stasics calculations in his head. "I can fix it!" he had announced frantically, looking at Jack out in the lab area.

Rose stood from knocking down a large, burly, warped government official with a bit of pipe and smiled at him. 'I know you can,' her eyes told him.

The problem was, the lab area wasn't shielded and there was no way to rig one. The dispersal would require a massive reversal field. Save the world, right this minute. Save the solar system by the time he could be sure he could do it safely. But by the time he could rig a temporal grace stasis shield to protect Rose and Jack? It would be down to save the Galaxy. The planet would be dead, the TARDIS would be fighting the effects the only way she knew how, which was a thing infinitely not to be contemplated. Life and time would go directly to hell.

But they would be alive.

Rose just nodded, her eyes blazing with strength, with courage, with determination. The whole Universe should orbit around her head, he thought, and yet again, she offered herself up to be harmed for life's sake. Jack had asked for a figure, then, looking him squarely and confidently in the eye. A single stream of numbers that would limit the power of the reversal wave, making it something the TARDIS could probably correct. Without flinching, the ex-Time Agent plugged the numbers in on his manipulator, and clutched Rose tightly, shielding her with his body.

The Doctor had touched a different set of buttons and saved the world.

He had made the fools who survived bring the TARDIS to him while he took the temporal equipment to tiny bits and then incinerated the bits with the sonic screwdriver. He had torn the lab apart until he found the blue prints and took great pleasure in stuffing them into the shredder. Then, he had carried his companions out to the TARDIS himself and laid them side by side in Rose's room. Jack, because he'd been shielding Rose, had gotten the worst of it, and ended up all of five or six years old. But Rose was still tiny, too, dainty, light, and too small to be more than twelve. Which meant, if he remembered correctly, that she was about thirteen.

For a finishing touch, he had sent everyone out and blown the lab to hell.

* * *

"Doctor?" came Jack's now high pitched, soft voice, interrupting his reverie and bringing him back to the here and now. There was a splash. "Oops."

"Oh, Jack, what happened?" the Doctor asked. He touched the door open and found the little time traveler standing in the stall, completely naked and covered in water.

The Time Lord threw a hand over his mouth to stifle the laughter he felt bubbling in his chest. When he could talk and breathe at the same time, he followed Jack's accusingly pointing finger and saw the Vortex Manipulator, lying in the bottom of the toilet, sparking rather unpleasantly.

"Didn't you want to _use_ that toilet?" he asked.

"Well, yeah," said Jack. "But I had to take my watch off, or it mighta got messed up. Then... well, it just happened."

"Your clothes?" the Doctor asked.

"It was a accident!" Jack defended loudly.

"Your clothes accidentally are on the floor?" the Doctor said.

Jack nodded, looking quite contrite for once.

"Jack Harkness," said the Doctor, slowly, "this has got to be an all time record. Even for you."

* * *

It took him quite some time to get Jack dressed and properly handled. Part of this time was due to the fact that he spent some moments glowering a hole in a man who looked entirely too much like a pedophile for the Doctor's comfort. OK, so the bloke had just come in to use the loo, but that didn't stop him from looking at Jack in a way that infuriated the Time Lord.

OK, so the bloke had only snapped a glance at him, shrugged and said, "Say, is that a human child?"

Still, that was enough to merit him a menacing death glower while the stranger dealt nervously and hastily with his own business and Jack struggled with his shirt, protected from view entirely by the Doctor's larger frame.

"I'd have thought," the Doctor said, when they were alone again, kneeling and tugging Jack's shirt onto his tiny frame himself, "that you'd have a bit more experience putting on your clothes hastily, little one."

Jack just shrugged, then smirked winsomely up at him, a tiny, cute version of his dimpled smile on his thin face. "Why do you think all my stories end the way they do?" Then Jack held his arms up and looked at the Doctor imploringly.

Sighing, the Time Lord picked him up, balanced Jack carefully against his jacket and carried him over to the sink. "Wash your hands, please."

Jack complied with only a little reluctance and the Doctor carried him back out, now worried that Rose had had too much time to cause chaos and destruction.

* * *

That had been the oddest thing, which was also the most obvious, the instant the two suddenly young humans awoke. Their little brains still had all their memories in them, but their minds were younger, less mature, less able to process what they saw and knew. Some of their reasoning had disappeared along with their shoes sizes and they occasionally did age-appropriate things for no readily apparent reason. Their personalities hadn't changed, exactly. Jack was still charming and chatty when he felt safe and comfortable. Rose was still sweet and uncannily wise when she was happy.

But in his small body, Jack rarely felt safe. And Rose, Rose was dealing with the hormonal shifts of a girl in early puberty. Last night, she'd baked them all cookies, as generous and helpful as you please. Then, she'd thrown an enormous tantrum because she couldn't find any edible ball bearings to put on the cookies.

The TARDIS had to deal with her, because the Doctor couldn't. What baffled him more than the fact that he couldn't deal with her, though, was that the time ship, admittedly sentient and ancient, _could_ deal with her. She'd locked Rose in a room - not her own - and let her throw things and shriek until she was exhausted. Then, she'd played the girl a lullaby and finally let the Doctor in.

He came in to find the room a wreck, and picked up a drowsing Rose from the eye of the storm. The girl had smiled sleepily and cuddled into his jacket. "You smell good," was all she said. "Like leather and star dust."

He'd carried her down the hall to her own room, tucked her into bed and, unable to resist it, fondly kissed her on the forehead. "'m sorry, Doctor," she'd said, and turned over and went to sleep.

"I'm sorry, too," he'd whispered, patted her hand, and let her sleep.

* * *

Right now, though, she was not being sweet.

There was a lovely young woman sitting at the table with her, smiling kindly and trying to talk to her. Rose had her arms crossed over her chest and was glowering quite angrily at the woman, all teenage disdain and adult disgust rolled into one pouting little girl.

"All I'm saying is that your father's obviously got his hands full and might need some experienced assistance," the woman was saying as the Doctor came into what was easily earshot for him, but not close enough for the hearing of humans or the half-human inhabitants of this little world they'd landed on this morning.

Father? thought the Doctor. Unpleasant, to say the least. For a variety of reasons.

Rose had apparently had all she was going to take. She stood up, planted her hands firmly on the table and leaned in close to the woman so she could look directly into the other's eyes. "For the last effing time, he's not my father," she hissed out, an impressive feat with no sibilants. "He's my lover, and we can handle things just fine, thank you."

Oh bloody hell.

The woman gaped at Rose in outraged horror. The Doctor charged over, tugging the psychic paper out of his pocket as he came, and shifting Jack around onto his hip. Jack giggled like he was on an amusement park ride. "Uh oh! Rosie's in trouble!" he sang out.

The Doctor looked expectantly at the nosy intruder. She was going to hit him, there was no way around that. But the woman seemed too frozen in shock even to do that, so he stuffed the psychic paper into her hand.

"I am neither her father nor her lover, madam," he said, rapidly. "I am her Doctor. She is in my care until such time as she can learn to behave herself in public." This last he said while glaring at Rose.

She shifted guiltily from foot to foot and chewed on her bottom lip, even while her eyes met him, screaming defiance. He sighed. "Young ladies who do not speak to guests politely do not get dessert," he added, the only possible thing he could think of with his parenting skills rusty from - how long since he lost Miranda? He'd never been good with her, either, actually. Or any of them, out of the companions he'd had before the War who were still children. He'd been better, and yet so much worse, with Ace, for example, or Adric.

Now, Rose was all defiance, not a single trace of remorse. The woman stood up and dropped the psychic paper, then stared at the three of them as if they were aliens from outer space - which they were, but that was beside the point. "I don't believe any of you," the woman said rudely.

Rose's eyes flashed and, before the Doctor could stop her, reached across the table and delivered Jackie Tyler's ultimate lesson across the woman's sharp, astounded face.

"That does it, Rose Tyler," said the Doctor, "I am taking you home to your mother." He grabbed her arm, snatched up the psychic paper, checked he still had Jack secure, and started for the door. Rose planted her feet and tried to refuse to move.

He moved his hand down her arm and forced her to take his hand. He didn't have to drag her after that, but she moved only reluctantly as they crossed the restaurant.

He heard the disturbance behind them before she did. "Jack, put your arms around my neck and hold tight." He laughed, surprised at how suddenly amused he felt. "I know you know how," he teased.

The boy giggled and did as he was told. The Doctor flung the door open and said one word, just one. "Run!"

* * *

By the time they reached the TARDIS, Jack was whining and Rose was swearing in Gallifreyan. It would have been hilarious if she didn't look so young and if she had any idea what she was saying. She'd obviously been listening a little more closely to his conversations with the TARDIS than he thought because, while her pronunciation was ghastly, she had every word in its grammatically correct location.

"Just open the door," the Doctor said. "You can bellow about what Archaellians do with hammers later."

She unlocked the door and they flew inside. He raced to the console and set the coordinates one-handed, juggling Jack from arm to arm without a thought.

Rose just stood and watched him. "Hold that switch," he told her, gesturing at the console vaguely. She did as she was told immediately and he grinned at her.

The TARDIS dematerialized. The Doctor shouted, "Fantastic!" and whooped with laughter. He reached up to ruffle Jack's hair, only right that moment realizing that it should have occurred to him, at least once in the proceedings, to set the child down while he ran the dematerialization sequence.

He put Jack safely into the jump seat and ruffled his dark hair again. "You did very well, children," he said. Then, he turned to consider Rose. She was staring morosely at her feet. "Ah. Ok, then. Jack needs a nap."

"Not sleepy," Jack said. He yawned and rubbed his eyes as he said it.

"I think you are," the Doctor said, patting the small hands. "Go on, little one, get to bed. We'll wait for you."

Jack pouted but the Doctor's expression must have convinced him because he got up finally and left the room. The Doctor then turned to Rose, to find her brushing sharply at her cheeks.

"I'm sorry," she wailed after a second. "And we were having a nice dinner, too."

He took a deep breath. If he recalled correctly, she had been complaining about the stemmy pieces. "Ok. Do you want to tell me what happened?"

"That woman... she was... she was awful, Doctor," Rose said, her voice trembling as she said it.

He hadn't seen or heard anything particularly awful about her but then, he trusted Rose's instincts about people better than his own most of the time. Of course, that was without forty-five gallons of pituitary hormones racing at break-neck speeds through her delicate human system. Still, she was his Rose. She deserved the benefit of the doubt. He leaned back against the console and straightened his leather jacket. "Go on," he said finally.

"She was one of those women, Doctor. The wicked step-mother kind, I mean."

"What?" he demanded. Rose Tyler and _fairy-tales_? Those hormones must be doing more damage than he thought. Probably the estrogen.

"The kind that make nice to the kids to try and hit on their dads. My mum says they're just horrible."

"She'd know," he said, before he thought.

"See, that's just like you. Always making a joke. I'm trying to tell you something important and you just get all... oh, never mind, you don't understand!"

"Why, because I'm an alien?" he asked, remembering the disappointing moment he'd had in the basement right when they'd first met Jack.

"No, because you're a man!" she shrieked.

He decided not to tell her how absurdly pleased that assertion made him feel. Instead, he knew he was going to have to deal with the rest of her behavior. "But why did you tell her... that?"

"She was a vamp, Doctor! A cheap whore in a nice suit." She sighed and threw herself into the Captain's chair and glowered at him. "And I forgot, ok?"

Excuse me? said a voice in his head, so he echoed it aloud before anything else could come out. Then, the rest of it came out, because she was still glaring at him, stonily. "How could you forget that, exactly... I mean, like that..."

"Not that, dammit!! Like I will ever forget that I'm not, like you'll ever let me!"

What?

"No," Rose continued, rolling her eyes, and innocently unaware of his expression. As usual. Rose was insanely good at reading people, but determinedly wouldn't or couldn't use her gifts on him. Most of his kinesics were human, he'd spent so much bloody time around them, and Rose could understand them entirely at a glance on other people, just not on him. Dammit all. "No, I forgot I was effing thirteen! If I was nineteen and said that, she might be a lot annoyed, but not freaked out. I screwed up." She took a deep breath and her whole body slumped. "I'm sorry."

He sighed deeply and leaned over her, taking her into his arms and holding her close, while she burrowed into his jacket and sobbed into his shoulder. "It's all right, Rose. The TARDIS is repairing the damage the time reversal did to you and Jack. You'll be right as rain in about another forty-eight hours or so."

"Thank God!" she said against his neck.

He laughed out loud and ruffled her hair. "Cute as a button, you are, but I'd much rather have you around without the puberty bit. Dunno how you apes can stand it, myself."

"It's hell," she agreed.

"You weren't this much trouble last time you were thirteen, were you?"

"Nah. Used to fight with Shireen all the time and got it out of my system. 'Cept I drove Mum mad."

"Fantastic," he said with a grin and set her on her feet. "Do me a favor and go check on the Captain-let, why don't you?"

"No problem. Do I have time for a nap, too? I think I wore myself out with all the shrieking and the slapping and stuff."

"Go ahead," he said with a nod. "You silly apes and your diurnal habits."

"Ugh," she said. "That sounds like a funny way to say we use separate loos!"

He laughed again as she walked out into the corridors.

* * *

After only two hours of solitary tinkering with the TARDIS console, the Doctor was surprised to discover that the ship was too quiet. He decided to get up and check on the little urchins. He told himself he was simply worried they were getting into mischief but, in truth, the TARDIS would have warned him.

No, he didn't miss Rose with her book, sitting barefoot in the jumpseat, commenting randomly and passing him tools. He certainly didn't miss Jack, under the console with him, helping impressively with the rewiring and rejigging of bits that had needed work since his fifth incarnation, of course making an innuendo of everything, and flirting with everyone, even the ship.

It was just, they were quiet. And kids and quiet was never necessarily a good thing.

He went to Rose's room, but she wasn't there. He'd even been polite and knocked for once since, as a teenager, she was more likely to have a tantrum than simply squeak and giggle if he walked in on her.

He stormed worriedly up the corridors to Jack's room and there he found them. They were lying side by side on Jack's bed, Rose holding his hand, Jack huddled in close to her and, low and behold, sucking his thumb. Any other time in the recorded history of time, he would have been furious to find them like this together, but their clothes were on - Rose was even still wearing her shoes - and it was pretty obvious what had happened.

She'd come in to check on the boy and he'd been having one of his nightmares. Rather than get the Doctor, she'd climbed into bed with him and held on to him. He imagined his precious Rose whispering soothing phrases to their small, adorable Jack, maybe even singing him a nonsense lullaby.

He reached over and removed Jack's thumb from his mouth. The Captain would not appreciate it if he had to straighten his teeth once he'd got back to full size. Then, he removed Rose's shoes and, very carefully, straightened them both against the pillows.

"Not sleepy," Jack muttered as the Doctor shifted him, but that was it. The green eyes remained closed. Rose held securely to his hand for a moment while he shifted her but, beyond that, she didn't even turn in her sleep.

He tucked the covers up tightly around their little chins and listened to the TARDIS humming soothingly in the back ground.

Ok, yeah, he was a bit tired. Maybe just a bit.

The overstuffed recliner from Rose's room appeared next to Jack's bed. The Doctor toed his shoes off and slung his jacket over Jack's door knob. With a heavy sigh, he settled in comfortably and picked up a book from Jack's night table. He stifled a laugh. The _Kama Sutra_, of course, the first Pan-galactic edition.

Rose shifted and muttered in her sleep. The Doctor set the book down and reached over to pat her hand. She grinned in her dreams. "_My_ Doctor," she said possessively. He beamed with delight and watched the blankets rise and fall with the even rhythm of their breathing.

Beautiful. Fantastic.

It was his last conscious thought for some time.

* * *

Half an hour later, Rose woke long enough to dig another duvet from the chest at the end of Jack's bed. She covered the Doctor quietly, stopping to check that his feet were tucked in. Then she climbed back into bed, soothed Jack's hair away from his face, and fell back to a happy sleep.

* * *

Tiny voices. Wake up. _No! Comfy._ Little, bitty, naughty whispers. _Warm. Safe._ Ickle tiny humans up to juvenile mischief. _They'd never._

There was a small bright flash. The Doctor opened one eye, peered down at the giggling pair of them, and leaned back in his chair. "Are ya happy then?" he asked.

"Yep," said Rose. "Proof at last, the Doctor does too sleep!"

"Better keep your camera away from my sonic screwdriver, then," he said and grudgingly sat up. "'Cuz I can fix your proof."

"You wouldn't!" she exclaimed, delightfully scandalized.

Jack giggled and ran over. "You ticklish, Doc?" he asked.

The Doctor jumped out of the chair in a single vault, a speed faster than human beings could manage. He snatched Jack up and cuddled the little boy, then tickled him under the chin. "Not as ticklish as you are!" he replied, grinning.

Jack laughed and fought and squealed. "Help me, Rosie!" Jack yelped.

Rose ran over and started tickling Jack's sides. The Doctor grinned at her and they tickled Jack until the boy was pleading for mercy. Then, he shifted Jack a little in his embrace and started in on Rose, too.

She shrieked in protest and golden, glorious mirth. Then, apparently for fun, she tripped him. He staggered a bit, dropping carefully to his knees, and set Jack lightly on his feet. They both pounced on him.

The Doctor didn't think he'd had this much fun in years.

When they were all breathless and lying happily on the floor, though, he wondered why he suddenly expected the adult Rose to stick her head in the door, an expression of mirthful distress on her face, to demand to know what they were up to in here.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two: Living With It**

"You want to go to a party, Rose, you have to dress properly. And, I'm sorry, but you're a bit young to be showing so much skin! This dress is fine."

"I hate you, and I hate that dress!" she shouted back.

"Fine," he said, crossing his arms over his chest, marring the effect only slightly with the dress dangling from his hand. "Then you won't go."

Jack wailed in protest.

"Now, look what you've done," Rose snapped and snatched the dress from the Doctor's hand. "I'll be ready in ten minutes!" she added and stormed into her room.

"She'll look fine in yellow," the Doctor told Jack a bit crossly as he helped the boy into his tiny tuxedo.

"She doesn't like lellow," Jack said, then frowned. "I wish I could talk right."

The Doctor chuckled and, unable to resist the serious little pout, kissed Jack on the forehead. "I wish you could, too, little one."

"Yer gettin' used to me all itty bitty and next thing, you won't want me to change back."

"'Course I do," the Doctor said bracingly. "Just, you're cuter like this."

Jack's glare was filled with disdain and miniature aggression. The Doctor had to turn away to keep from laughing at him. Then, he went back to doing up Jack's tie.

"You're good at this," Jack said with a knowing smirk.

The Doctor rolled his eyes. "I've been dressing myself for 900 years, thank you. It's not hard to transfer to someone else."

Jack continued to smirk as the Doctor stood and took his tiny hand. "That's not what I meant and you know it," Jack's smirk said. Thankfully, the boy didn't repeat it aloud.

* * *

Rose joined them in the console room some twenty minutes later, and now she was all smiles. "Well, don't you both look handsome," she said cheerfully. She came over and straightened Jack's bow tie, then stood on her toes and did the same to the Doctor's. He grinned at her. 

"Don't hate me anymore?" he asked, a trifle concerned but mostly teasing.

"I could never hate you," she said softly, endearingly. "So tell me about this party.

"An old friend of mine is throwing this bash to celebrate his fifth anniversary. They invited me ages ago, but I've never had the time to show up. Still, feel like I should. They're very important to me. Nobody else I know will be there, probably. 'Cept maybe Winifred. Should be mostly her friends, though, she doesn't particularly care for reminders of his old job."

"Then, will she want you there?"

He grinned. "I'm the exception."

* * *

"God," breathed Rose, "it's like that bloody Embassy Ball on My Fair Lady!" 

The Doctor grinned down at her, small and soft in her pale yellow dress, and couldn't help thinking he probably should have brought her when she was older instead. Still, this was safe. They were too small to be saving the world right now. He tucked Rose's hand safely into the crook of his arm, took Jack's hand in his other, and walked them carefully through the crowd milling in the doorway.

Jack bumped into a large, golden haired man as they made their way across the room. The man turned with some surprise and looked at the boy. Jack looked up at him with, the Doctor could clearly see, covetousness and admiration. "Don't do it," he cautioned the child carefully.

Jack sighed and rolled his eyes.

"Ancelyn," the Doctor said politely to the burly knight now smiling down at them.

"Merlin!" replied Ancelyn, as he always did, recognizing the Doctor no matter what he looked like.

"Look familiar yet?" the Doctor asked.

Ancelyn beamed and shook his head. The Doctor let go of Rose long enough to shake Ancelyn's hand, then brought her forward to introduce her.

"Can this be?" Ancelyn breathed, staring at her with wide and fascinated eyes. He took her hand and bowed over it in the most courtly fashion imaginable. "Dear lady, I am ever your true and humble knight. I crave your pardon that I did not recognize you immediately, for your light shines forth to brighten the room, nay, the world in your very presence."

Rose, for all that she looked utterly charmed and bewildered at this extravagant speech, managed without giggling to say, "That's all right. Pleased to meet you, Sir Knight."

So it was coming soon. Interesting. Still, he didn't like the way Ancelyn was admiring her. "Where's Winifred?" he asked and took Rose's arm again. Jack fidgeted.

"I'm bored, Doctor," he whined.

"And who is this strapping young lad?" asked Ancelyn, leaning down to get a good look at Jack.

Jack smiled precociously at him. "Captain Jack Harkness," the little flirt said, and held out a hand.

"Stop it, Jack," said Rose. "Be nice or I won't dance with you."

"Please Rosie?" said Jack, gesturing at the dance floor with a suggestion in his eyes.

"Go ahead," the Doctor said, feeling they were safe enough here. "Just, Rose, please don't let him get into the alcohol?"

"I won't, Doctor," she promised. Then, she gestured him close. He leaned over and, when she was near enough to whisper in his ear, she kissed him on the cheek instead.

Then she led Jack away. The Doctor turned to watch them, a hand on his face where her sweet lips had graced it. "Fantastic," he whispered.

Ancelyn nodded knowingly. "Don't tell me," said the Doctor. "I want to find out for myself. C'mon, let's go see Winifred."

* * *

He made his way through the party, relieved beyond sanity and expectation to find that Sarah Jane was not in attendance. She had been the one person he was afraid might still be invited. Benton was there, of course, and Harry, but Sarah was out of the country. The Doctor didn't think he could stand another cat-fight today. 

Brigadier Winifred Bambera had been kind and gentle and refrained politely from asking about Ace, for which the Doctor was insanely grateful, since he didn't know how to answer.

He was just thinking with annoyance and sorrow that it might have been a mistake to come here after all when he felt the small, familiar hand tucking itself into its proper place inside his own. "This is really beautiful," she said softly.

"'Lo, Rose," he said. "Where's Jack?"

Rose smiled and gestured to a crowd of giggly young women in the corner of the room. They were all fawning on the darling little boy, hugging and kissing him and telling him what a fine little gentleman he looked. The Doctor sighed. "At least tell me he's acting his purported age?"

"Oh, yes. He's absolutely eating it up, Doctor. He can flirt with them all he wants and none of them will expect a marriage proposal." She smiled. "Sometimes, I think Jack isn't as big a sex fiend as he likes to let on."

He smiled and nodded. The little string ensemble in the corner began to play a wistfully familiar tune. The Doctor seemed to remember... Rose in a yellow dress very similar to the one she now wore and maybe... hiding in a coat closet? To shake off the baffled familiarity, he offered her his hand and swept a courtly bow when she took it. "May I have this dance, my lady?" he asked.

She giggled that fairy bell twinkle and nodded, her free hand over her mouth, and all the light in the world in her eyes.

Even when she was a baby, she was lovely.

He stepped into the dancers with her in his arms and waltzed her slowly across the floor. People stepped back to watch them, grinning and sighing, thinking they were seeing a father with his daughter, instead of a space alien with the temporally shifted woman he loved.

Oops.

A Dalek could say that, but not him.

* * *

When the song ended, they applauded with the rest of the crowd, and he led her off in the direction of two other people he had just spotted. He approached quite deferentially. The last time they had seen him, they had had to deal with a suicidally insane Time Lord. Their forceful kindness had saved his life and his mind, what was left of it. He was enormously grateful that they would even want him here. After all, he had, among other things, broken half the mirrors in this beautiful old house. 

Doris spotted him first and she moved quickly for her age. "Oh, Doctor," she said sweetly, and hugged him quite forcefully. "We're so glad you could come."

"Thanks," he replied shyly, and felt Rose's clever, analytical eyes watching him and studying the situation. Oh, sure. _Now_ she would decide to read him. "This is Rose," he said. "My companion."

"Isn't she very young to be wandering around with you, Doctor?" said Doris, with no little concern.

"It's a very long story," said Rose, her tone an echo of her real age. "Really, you wouldn't half believe it."

"I'll believe everything where this one's concerned." The Doctor turned to the speaker and smiled nervously. The rigorously observant hazel gaze weighed him, studied his reactions. Eyes trained by war, by sorrow, and by the best military program this whole planet could offer, eyes that had seen far too much for human kind, they belonged to one of the only men in all of time who understood him, understood everything.

"Brigadier," the Doctor said, and beamed at him.

"Oh, no," said Doris, "please don't do that again. Alistair, just get the Doctor a drink, please, before he rambles off..."

"Rose, Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stuart. And his lovely wife, Doris."

"You and people's names," said Rose, "I swear."

"A name is a very precious thing, Rose Tyler," he told her.

She stared at him, as if reading something behind that sentence. There was something there, actually, several eldritch truths, in fact, things that no one alive now knew. But she couldn't see them, could she?

She blinked and shook her head. "I know," she agreed.

To escape the seriousness, he laughed at her. "'A rose by any other name would smell as sweet,'" he quoted. "But it wouldn't sound right at all."

She grinned. "Yeah, 'magine if Mum had named me Herman!"

Doris actually laughed at that. "You're a lovely little girl, aren't you?"

The Brigadier drew the Doctor away slightly to talk with him. "It's good to see you better now," his oldest friend said softly.

"She fixed me, the rest of the way," he replied honestly. "Dunno how I'd get on without her."

"I'd imagine not," said the Brigadier kindly. "How long..."

"About twenty years or so, give or take. Most mornings, I can look myself in the eye now." He grinned. "I'm as sane as you are," he said.

"That isn't saying much," replied the Brigadier with a trace of his old snap and a lot of his dry humor. "As one old soldier to another, there's not a sane one of us left if we live this long."

The Doctor nodded, but didn't know what to add.

Jack spared him the trouble by picking that exact moment to race up to him, shrieking like he was being pursued by Time Agents. The Doctor caught the little boy under his arms and lifted him up, holding him close and running a hand through the soft hair. "It's all right, Jack," he soothed, quietly. "What's wrong?"

A little girl in a small, puffy white dress ran up in Jack's wake. The Doctor looked at the Captain, at the girl, and at the expression on Rose's face. He couldn't help the explosion of laughter that let itself out of his chest.

* * *

The party was going quite well, without the children causing more than a little bit of chaos. "Where's their mother?" was the usual question. His stony-eyed glower (he hadn't felt like repeating himself fifty times) was usually enough to set them back. 

Harry Sullivan made friends with Rose by dancing with her and calling her a lovely lady. The Doctor had noted with interest that time had put a bit of weight on the young doctor and more than a bit of grey in his stylish dark curls.

"He reminds me of you," she said, again, when the Doctor put a protective arm around her shoulder at the end of a dance.

She next danced with a teenaged relative of Doris's and the Doctor felt his hearts nearly stop from watching them. The boy was rail thin with delicate, attractive features and shoulder length, jet-black hair. The picture they made was inexpressibly painful, and the Doctor couldn't, for the life of him, figure out why.

When Rose left this boy, she snagged the Doctor for another dance. "He said he's too old for me," she told him, with a giggle. "And I wanted to die laughing, 'cuz he's like, fifteen or something. Too young for me in real life. Pretty, though."

The Doctor smiled as she yawned. "Funny how everything looks different through younger eyes, isn't it?"

"Oh, yes," she agreed. "Where's Jack?"

"Asleep in the guest room upstairs."

"He's going to be so furious when he gets back to his right age," she said mischievously. "I mean, he keeps missing everything because he's so little."

"His body's a child's body," said the Doctor, "and it needs sleep. Don't worry, it's probably doing the boy a world of good."

"Yeah," she agreed, looking around with an animated smile. "I want some wine."

"No," he said.

"Pretty please?" she pouted.

"Rose, it's not nice to use your powers for evil."

"Pretty, pretty, please?"

He sighed and led her off the dance floor. Finding a seat on a sofa, he snagged a wine glass and a bottled water from the nearest waiter. He quaffed half the wine himself, handed it to her, added the water and nodded. "There ya go, French style!"

She pouted but drank her watered wine without further objections.

* * *

In fact, Rose remained calm through most of the evening. But when one tipsy young woman managed to sidle up to him and demand a dance, the light of battle came up in her eyes. "Doctor," she whined, "I'm tired." 

"I'll take you home in a minute, Rose," he said, concerned that the girl in front of him was a little too inebriated to have much sense. He looked around to see if he could spot signs of an escort or their host.

"But Doctor..."

"She calls you Doctor," said the woman, slipping into his personal space and earning herself another death glower from Rose Tyler. The Doctor's head was starting to hurt. "Isn't that the sweetest?!" She took her life into her own hands and patted Rose on the head. She was lucky she didn't lose the limb, or at least a digit or two. "Go on, honey. Go dance with one of the nice little boys while I talk to your daddy." She draped one arm around his shoulder and tried to pull his head down.

Out of the corner of his eye, while trying not to make a scene, he saw very clearly as Rose's lip curled. Then, she apparently had a clever idea because her eyes lit up. He could practically see a light bulb appear over her head. She stood up, on the sofa, and then, with a small sigh, took a step. Of course, she fell off. Of course she twisted just so, so that even the Doctor's lightning fast reflexes couldn't catch her (how did she do that?). Of course, she managed to bump the young woman, jostling her so that the dark wine the woman was drinking poured down the front of her bright red dress.

Of course, she hit the floor with a thud and began to wail. The Doctor knelt to help her up and she had the unmitigated gall to wink cheekily at him, then continued sobbing theatrically as if she'd broken her leg.

"Story of my bloody life," he sighed. "Jeopardy-friendly, can't take you anywhere.

Benton appeared and chivvied the red-dressed woman off - she'd apparently come as his date. "Get a girl with a brain, next time, John," the Doctor advised and lifted Rose into his arms.

"Oh, Lucy, for God's sake," said Benton, as his date shrieked furiously about the abuse. He led her off with an apologetic look at the Doctor and Rose.

"Bring her upstairs," Doris said quietly. Then, she looked at Rose and sighed. "If I didn't know better, I'd swear this little one is jealous."

"Well, you know, kids," the Doctor said, quite embarrassed at the suggestion. Rose giggled into his shoulder.

He set her down in a chair next to the bed where Jack was sleeping. "Let me look at that leg," he said as he pulled out the sonic screwdriver.

"It's fine," she told him winningly. "Feel all better now." She even wiggled her toes in her dainty little sandals to make a point.

"I'll bet," he replied drily. "So, tell me, were you jealous? Aside from being half Benton's age, and dizzy as Jack in a brothel, I didn't see anything particularly wrong with her."

Rose frowned. "I didn't like her shoes," she said haughtily.

"Oh," he replied and rolled his eyes. "Of course, her shoes. How could I have missed it." He grinned at her and tapped her little nose. "Possessed by demons, those shoes, and out to take over the world, too, I suppose."

"Well, they didn't go with her dress, anyway. That's evil enough, innit?"

The Doctor sighed. "What am I going to do with you?"

* * *

The Brigadier let them stay the night. Actually, Doris made them stay the night. The Doctor sat up with his old friend in his study and they talked for long hours about everything they'd been through together. 

"And I will never forget the time we ended up stuck in that tower with, what, half a dozen of you?"

"Four. There were five at the time, and the fourth got pulled into a vortex." He sighed. "Everything was so much easier, then, and I didn't even realize."

"Your boy has your eyes, a bit, I thought," the Brigadier said, obviously to change the subject away from the dangerous waters that were memories of Gallifrey. "And a bit of your look, too, all mysterious. The girl... she favors her mother?"

The Doctor grinned. "She does a bit, yeah. Doesn't slap near as much as Jackie Tyler, though. I messed up her personal timeline, brought her back to her mum's a year late if you can believe. And oh, that woman, she'll slap anyone, any reason, doesn't matter. Hates me a bit, actually." At the Brigadier's incredulous stare, he grinned. "They're not my kids. They're not even kids, actually, couldn't you tell?"

"That they're not yours?" the Brigadier said, softly, shaking his head. "No. I honestly couldn't."

"Ah, well," the Doctor said, feeling quite embarrassed, "you don't have a lot of experience with kids, do you?" He was conveniently omitting from his memory the fact that the Brigadier had raised up 30 years worth of raw, green, 18 year old recruits with a combination of stern discipline, wry humor, and vague paternal empathy. He'd done so well with them, in fact, that they willingly followed him into forty kinds of instant death. They learned, too, so well that their successors, 10 years later, had followed the Doctor to the letter while he shouted the Brigadier's orders.

The Brigadier gave him a look that reminded him of all these facts, but the Doctor shoved those facts back into the closet in his head.

"S'pose Jack could be mine," the Doctor said with a shrug. "'Cept he's human. And normally quite a bit older. Captain Jack Harkness, actually."

The Brigadier put on a placid expression, one that told the Doctor the man knew something. But the Brigadier had earned his respect. The very first time the Doctor had picked up a weapon in the Time War, the Brigadier had suddenly had something the human had deserved for years.

Of course, considering he'd broken into UNIT's arsenal to arm the first weapons they'd used, it wasn't without reason.

He left it alone. "Actually, I've only got about twenty-four hours to go before they're back to their normal, grown-up, jeopardy friendly selves."

"Good news, then," the Brigadier said and stood. "I'll see you for breakfast then, I hope."

"Yeah. Then, I think I'd better get out of here. You know what happens if I hang around."

"Maybe the world will be kind for once," the Brigadier said with a dubious expression.

"Maybe," the Doctor agreed. "And maybe the tooth fairy will leave Rose a basket of kittens while she sleeps. Sorry, not buying it."

The Brigadier smiled. "I know you're not. I wouldn't, if I were you, either."


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3: The One With Jackie In It 

"Where are we going now, Doctor?" Rose asked.

"Thought we'd drop in on your mum, actually," he said. "Sort of surprise her."

"She'll kill you."

_Better me than you_, he thought. "Nah. She'll be so happy to see you, she won't even notice you're thirteen."

"Mum's not stupid, Doctor," Rose said resentfully.

"Oh," said the Doctor. "I didn't know."

She hit him. "I don't want to go see my mum!" she added resentfully.

The Doctor, though, had his mind made up. He was taking her to Powell Estates because it was quiet and he'd had a feeling they'd been pushing their luck thus far with trying to keep the tiny humans out of harm's way for the entire time they were small.

"I want to meet your mum, Rosie," said Jack quietly.

Rose rounded on him and glowered. "Well, I don't. And stop sucking your thumb, you're going to mess your teeth up."

"I'm not," said Jack, hastily whipping his thumb out of his mouth and hiding his hand behind his back. He looked up at the Doctor with pleading green eyes.

The Doctor shook his head. They looked like siblings, honestly, they did. Then, he grinned. Fantastic, maybe that idea would stick when they were grown back up and...

_And what, Doctor?_

He pushed that train of thought firmly away and turned to the console to start setting the coordinates.

"Please don't," Rose begged. "Please!"

"Why is it that, all through time and space, every other sentence I hear out of you is 'Let's go see my mum!'. And then I want to go, and you're complaining! I don't understand you stupid apes at all!"

"Mean old alien!" she snapped.

"Well, two out of three, anyway," he agreed. "Go get cleaned up, we're going to see your mother."

"No!"

"Rose, I'm warning you."

"No!" she shrieked.

He reached over, picked her up, and carried her down the corridor to the first room he came to. Conveniently, it was filled with cushions. He set her down inside it and watched her little face turn red with fury. "Go on," he said, "throw a tantrum. Knock yourself out." He thought very hard for a moment, and something Doris had said last night clicked into place. "Mind, it's not very attractive, but if you want, go ahead."

The effect on the girl was nigh miraculous. All the fury dropped out of her, and her face went very white, then very red. She drew in a deep breath and ran a shaking hand through her hair. At last, she straightened and looked him in the eye. "Of course, Doctor," she said in the quietest, most reasonable tone of voice. "I'm sure Mother will be glad to see us. I'm sorry for my outburst." Then, she grinned shakily and held out her small hand. "Must be the hormones," she said.

He nodded calmly and took her hand to lead her to her own room.

"Did you spank her?" Jack asked when the Doctor came back into the console room.

"Absolutely not. I'd never."

"I would," Jack said gleefully, and since he was still so tiny, the suggestive smile on his face looked impish instead of wolfish. "You should try it."

"What I should try," said the Doctor, approaching Jack with a stern frown on his face, "is washing your mouth out with soap. Go on, get changed."

The little Captain looked up at him, eyes round with shock. He seemed to realize, though, very quickly, that the Doctor was quite serious, so he took off for his room at a dead run. The Doctor sighed, lowered his head to the console, and forced himself not to thump himself unconscious. "What did I do to deserve this?" he asked the TARDIS.

Get a clue, she replied, silently.

"Bloody hormones," the Doctor muttered.

* * *

"Hello, Jackie," said the Doctor when she opened the door to her flat.

The woman looked at him and shrieked. Possibly, this was because he was holding Jack in his arms. The Doctor had had an unbelievably brilliant idea about how to avoid getting slapped. Thus, he'd dressed Jack in an adorable little sailor suit the TARDIS had turned up for them. Jack had grumbled and complained and insisted that the TARDIS was laughing at him. (She was, too, but how was the boy to know that?) He'd also vowed revenge on the Time Lord, but the Doctor didn't see how that was possible.

Rose, too, had giggled quite a bit, and snapped plenty of pictures of them.

The Doctor was now holding the tiny Captain quite comfortably in his arms because he had the idea that Jackie wouldn't slap if she had to go around a child to do it.

Turned out, he was right. Instead, she turned stark white and shaking and backed away from the door, from the Doctor, and from the little boy. "H-How l-long... Oh my GOD!" She dropped to the sofa and started fanning herself with her hand.

"She screams," said Jack, over the Doctor's shoulder to Rose.

For some reason, she was hiding behind him and didn't look to be planning to come out any time soon. "Yeah," she whispered. "She's good at that."

Jackie took a moment more to pull herself together and rounded on the Doctor. "Let me see him," she said, softly.

The Doctor had a pretty good idea what she was thinking, so he tried to move to reveal Rose. She wasn't having any of it. In fact, when he turned his head, she was no where to be seen.

"Where's my daughter?" Jackie demanded. "What have you done, you filthy alien?!"

"Now, hold on, Jackie," he said, but Jackie wasn't listening. She was carefully prying Jack out of the Doctor's arms. "This isn't what it looks like," he tried to add, over the sound of Jackie cooing.

She finally got Jack loose and held him up, studying his face. "And aren't you just the most precious little boy ever. What's your name?"

The boy shot the Doctor a vengeful, satisfied little grin. "Jack," he said, in the sweetest, most precious little voice you ever heard. "For my Gran." Butter wouldn't melt in his mouth as he smiled softly and adoringly at her.

"I see," said the older woman, as calmly as the Doctor had ever heard her speak. "Well," she said, "at least you don't have your father's ears. You sit right here, Jack Tyler, and I'll go get you some tea and biscuits. Your Dad can come with me." She reached over, fast as lightning, and snatched the Doctor's ear. Holding it forcibly between thumb and forefinger, she half-led, half-dragged the Time Lord into the kitchen with her.

The very second she let him loose, the Doctor moved to put the table between them. "Jackie, I swear to you, this is not what it looks like!"

"Then what the hell is it, Doctor!" she shrieked, circling the table like a cat stalking prey. Her hands flexed like she was already throttling him. Make it a tiger. "Because what it looks like means I'm gonna kill you."

Make it a saber toothed tiger. A big one.

"He's not..." the Doctor managed, but got no further because Jackie snatched up a mug and hurled it at him. Time Lord reflexes, he caught it, but that only seemed to infuriate her more.

"He looks like you, he's got your funny eyes, and your hair. But he favors Pete a bit, too, actually."

"Really? said the Doctor, astonished. "How is that possible?"

Jackie shrieked again, and came after him, over the table. Rose picked that moment to finally turn up and rescue him.

Jackie rounded on her and very nearly, it looked like, lost her grip on reality. She planted her hands on the table and started breathing heavily. After a few seconds to regain her composure, while Rose hovered frantically near her elbow, she stood up and leveled a glare that promised all the torments of the damned on the Doctor.

"She looks just like her mum," Jackie said. "Thank God. So now what're you gonna try to tell me? Are they human? Inside, I mean? Or are they alien spawn?"

"Oi!" shouted Rose. "Even if he was mine, he'd not be spawn and you can't say that."

"Not you, too," the Doctor pleaded. "Rose..."

"Where is Rose?" Jackie asked. "Because I'm gonna give her a piece of my mind, even if she's my age, now."

"I'm right here, Mum," said Rose, sweetly.

"I'm not your mother, Sweetheart," Jackie said, but not unkindly. "I'm your Gran. Sit down, I'll make us tea."

"I knew this was a mistake," Rose told the Doctor, who slumped into a chair and nodded. "I told you it was a mistake, but you don't listen. Think you know everything."

"She even sounds like her mother at that age. Good God." Jackie bustled around making tea and hunting up biscuits, still looking quite a bit dazed.

"Just sit down," Rose said softly, getting up to take over the tea-making herself. "Sit down and let the Doctor explain."

"She calls you Doctor, too?" Jackie demanded.

"Doctor," said Jack as he stuck his head in through the door.

"And him, too," said Jackie, in shock, and sank into a chair, finally, looking like that dead faint was coming really soon. "I give up."

"What is it, Captain?" said the Doctor, by way of emphasis.

"Mickey was here. I opened the door, and he screamed and ran away."

"Oh, no!" wailed Rose, jumped up, and left the room.

"Rose!" the Doctor shouted. "Get back here!"

The front door thudded and she was gone.

* * *

"Right, Jackie, let me make this very short. That little girl was Rose Tyler. She got caught in a temporal distortion field. The boy is Captain Jack Harkness, and he's in a great deal of trouble."

"Sorry," said Jack, looking not the least bit, "I just couldn't resist."

"Well, let me tell you something, Doctor," snarled Jackie, prodding him sharply in the chest. "You'd just better go get my daughter back and you'd better do it right now. And in her correct age. 'Cuz you know something, I'm not raising her again, I'm not. She was impossible at that age, like you can't even believe, and then you'll just turn up after I've gone through it all again and snatch her up and I'm not having it. I can't even tell you the number of times she scared me to death. Kissing total strangers in coat closets, having chips with old men when she's s'posed to be meeting Mickey and Shireen. And I can't even think about the summer she was sixteen, and then all that garbage with that disgusting Jimmy Stone. He left town, went to America and joined a cult! If I didn't know you weren't involved, I'd be sure it was all your fault!"

"You can't even begin to imagine how incredibly brave your daughter is," the Doctor interrupted softly, in a quiet, dangerous voice. "Do anything to save a life, your girl, and stronger then whole star systems besides. She's rubbed off on Captain Jack, too, and made him a right dashing hero. So don't try to blame me for her, Jackie Tyler! She's fantastic all on her own." He turned around and headed for the door. "Can you watch the Captain for me while I go find Rose? Jack?"

No answer. The Doctor looked round, hearts heavy in his chest. "Jack, where are you?"

"He must have gone to find her," said Jackie softly.

"He can't even do up his buttons properly!" the Doctor exclaimed. "If he comes back, call Rose's cell phone. I've got to go find them."

* * *

He charged over to the garage and found Mickey the Idiot sitting on the curb, looking thunderstruck and heart-broken. "Always knew it would happen one day," said Mickey the Idiot as the Doctor stormed up to him. "Just knew it. One day she'd come home with an alien baby in her arms and smiling like that at you and all. I just can't believe..."

"Where is she?" the Doctor demanded.

"What?"

"We haven't got time for your silly theatrics, Ricky, where's Rose?"

The boy looked at him, blankly. "I... she didn't come to... she's..." He looked up, then jumped to his feet, following the Doctor. "She's not been here," he said to the back of the leather jacket. "What, lost her already, have you? Hah!"

"Shut it, Ricky," the Doctor growled. "She came charging out of the flat the minute Jack told us you'd been by."

"Wait... Jack? So that's that Captain's kid, not yours!? What, don't you aliens..."

"I am not going into this with you." The Doctor stormed across the estate toward the TARDIS.

"So, he what? Treated Rose like some slag and then left you to put them back together, so you thought you'd just dump them back here?"

Rage, titanic, thundering, seething, all encompassing rage flooded through the Doctor's veins. Nothing, nothing was going to save Ricky the Idiot, not this time. He rounded on the boy, grabbed him by the collar, and flung him up against the side of the TARDIS.

The boy was almost as pale as Rose, looking at the Doctor with enormous, terrified eyes. "Tell me where he is, Doctor," the boy grated out, even though he was trembling in the Time Lord's grip, even though his hands were shaking while he tried to prize himself free. "I'm gonna kill him."

The Doctor dropped him and turned away. "Sorry," he muttered.

"What?"

"You don't understand what's going on, you stupid ape!" the Doctor shouted, turning back to him again, hands clenched into fists and nails biting into his own palms to stop himself throttling the young human. "It's only that you care for her... If it wasn't that..."

"Then tell me what the hell is going on, Doctor, because I swear to any gods there are that I'll murder the bastard who hurt her!"

"If it were what you thought, Mickey," the Doctor said softly, "you'd've had to dig him up first."

A short, childish scream echoed through the estates. "Jack!" the Doctor shouted and took off toward the sound at a dead run. Mickey was following him without even a pause.

"Short version," the Doctor said as they ran. "I keep having to tell this, dammit. Jack and Rose got caught in a short-term temporal distortion field. They are, respectively, six and thirteen. Rose ran out after you, Jack went out after her while I was arguing with Jackie. If I have to explain myself another time, I'm going to go mad."

The Doctor slowed as he approached the area at the back of the little play park. He was certain he'd heard the scream from here. He dropped behind a bin and peered around it until he caught sight of a shadow and a vivid red light that shouldn't be there. There were two small shapes before the impossible field of darkness - it was broad daylight out right now - and he knew he'd found his two companions. He held back to ascertain what was going on, flinging an arm across Mickey's chest to keep the boy back as well.

"Filthy Time-brats," the shadow said, in a voice like nails on a blackboard. "Children of indolence and insolence."

"What do you want with us?" Rose demanded. Even in danger, even thirteen years old, she was magnificent.

"Nothing," said the thing, its voice all the more frightening because it sounded utterly unconcerned.

"Let her go," Jack said. "If you don't need us, let her go."

"Such a brave little boy," the creature purred. The Doctor was suddenly struck by a wave of intense pride. "Protect your sister, boy. And she'll protect you. It won't matter, you're only the bait."

"What are you going to do?" demanded Rose. It was almost as if she knew he was there, and knew he would need more information. "The Doctor won't do what you want, so you'll just have to kill us!"

This time, it was Mickey's hand on his arm that stayed the Doctor. He shot the boy a weak smile of gratitude. "Mickey, I need the morpho-concatenator from the TARDIS," the Doctor whispered. "It's in the console room, blue, about six inches across and covered in lights. Here." He thrust his TARDIS key into the boy's hand. "Go, I'll make sure nothing happens to them."

Mickey nodded at last and sprinted off, keeping low. The thing probably wouldn't have noticed him, anyway, as he was utterly human. If it thought he was going to get the Doctor, it probably would have let him, even if it saw him.

"Your race died," the shadow thing mused. "All of your kind, throughout all the Universe, stopping anyone else from learning what they knew. And they finally died. But he survived, the last one, their ultimate meddler. And now you two." The thing did something to the device it held and the light cranked brighter. "I'm going to do the Universe a favor and finish off the Time Lords, once and for all."

"It'll never work," Jack shouted.

Rose snapped, at the same time, "You can stop the tide if you want to, but not the Doctor!"

"Your father will be no match for this little device. Would you care for a sample?"

Rose suddenly stood up clearly against the red light. The Doctor could make out her small face, shining, magnificent, impossibly infuriated. "This is absolutely the last time I'm saying this!" she shrieked and moved with incredible, almost inhuman speed toward the shadow thing. The Doctor jumped up and raced toward them. "He is NOT **MY** _**FATHER**_!!" Her hand shot forward as if pitching a cricket ball.

The shadow thing turned the red light device toward the Doctor. Whatever Rose had thrown hit the lens with a sound like all the crystal in the world exploding. There was only one chance now. The Doctor snatched the sonic screwdriver from his pocket, ducked under the explosion of staggered light, and turned the screwdriver on the device.

Rose dropped to the ground and rolled, pulling Jack to her as she moved.

As if in slow motion, the device started to expand with a sickly blue radiation. "What have you done?!?" shrieked the maddened shadow thing.

"Stopped you," said the Doctor, coldly. Then, he threw himself onto the children, snatched them up and swung Rose over his shoulder. He tucked Jack safely under his arm and ran for all their lives.

There was a muffled pop as they exited the play park. The Doctor turned slightly to see the shadow thing spiraling into the radiant blue light that was blossoming from the device. Not far enough. He kept running full out. Jackie and Mickey were racing up the street, so he thrust Jack into Mickey's arms and they all thundered down the pavement as if pursued by wolves.

With a sound like a jet engine taking off and twice as loud, the thing behind them exploded. The Doctor jerked Rose over his shoulder, tucking her child's body into his much larger one and dropped to his knees. "Down," he shouted, dragging Jackie closer with one hand.

A great rushing wind swept over their prostrate forms.

Then, there was silence.

The Doctor sat up and began automatically checking Rose over for injuries. She smiled shakily at him and pointed over to where Mickey was holding Jack.

"Is he all right?" Mickey asked worriedly.

Jack was curled up in a very small ball, shaking. The Doctor set Rose down gently, then reached over for Jack.

"Not gonna cry," Jack whispered. "Not gonna..."

The Doctor reached into Jack's little self-made cocoon and took the tiny hands in his. "You can, if you want, little one," he said softly. Jack looked up at him, green eyes wide and terrified. The Doctor held his arms open.

Without another word, Jack flung himself into them, wrapped his arms around the Doctor's neck, and sobbed.

* * *

"Is he ok?" Rose asked, entering her bedroom with tentative steps. She carried a glass of water in one hand and some children's Tylenol in the other. Jackie hovered outside the door, looking like a mother who very much wanted to mother the hell out of someone right now.

The Doctor smiled at them and nodded, then reached over and patted the tiny hands of their brave little Captain. He jerked his head toward the door and they all stepped out. With a quick kiss on Jack's small forehead, the Doctor followed them and closed the door behind him.

"He's just terribly embarrassed. His body's that of a six year old, and it tells him he's got to cry when he's that scared. He used up every ounce of adult in him while the Midid was attacking you two. A nap's the best thing for him, then some comfort food for dinner and he'll be right as rain."

Jackie looked at him as if she'd never seen him before in his life. "What?" the Doctor said.

She just shook her head, wordlessly, hand over her mouth.

"What'd'ya know," said the Doctor, beaming. "Jackie Tyler, speechless."

"Oh, you," she said, but she said it astonishingly fondly.

"What happened?" the Doctor asked Rose as they all found seats at the kitchen table.

She looked at him wistfully, so the Doctor patted his knee and smiled at her softly. Rose grinned and came over to him, let him pull her into his lap and rested her back against his chest.

"I went out to find Mickey. Thought he'd be down near the play park, because that's where we always went when we had fights when we were kids. But there was something off, something weird. I almost came back to find you, but then I was afraid the whatsits had Mickey."

"And Jack?"

"He came up right behind me that instant and he said 'That's a Midid, I thought they'd died in the...' Well, then I knew something was wrong and I decided we'd better come back because Jack's so little right now. Then... I dunno what happened. One minute we were standing there, the next we were lying in front of it."

"Ok," said the Doctor, and looked up worriedly toward Jackie. The older woman was giving him a dreamy, vacant smile while she made tea, so it was nothing to worry about, he supposed. Maybe.

"Then, there was the traditional exchange of threats - my big scary menace is bigger than your big scary menace. That sort of thing."

The Doctor grinned. "Fantastic, Rose Tyler, absolutely fantastic."

"Thanks," she said softly.

"Tea for you, Doctor. Juice for Rose."

"I don't want it," said Rose.

"Oh, hell," said Jackie. "Here we go. Drink your juice, Rose."

"No."

The Doctor smirked. "You need the vitamins, Rose. Good for running for your life. Makes you healthier and all that. And we definitely want to keep you healthy."

She glared at him, but drank the juice.

Jackie just shook her head.

"Tell you what," said the Doctor, "when Jack wakes up, we'll go out to dinner."

"Oh, no," said Jackie. "I'm not taking that one out, you've no idea what you're asking for."

"Yeah, he does, Mum," said Rose. "I destroyed a salad at him yesterday. Besides, I don't think I want to go out, either. Can we stay in and see a DVD? It's easier than me getting into another fight, don't you think?"

The Doctor smiled. "That's fine. What do you want, I'll go bring it up from the TARDIS."

"Actually, I was hoping..."

He sighed. "All right." His tongue very nearly curled up at what he was about to say. But, Rose had asked. "Jackie, would you like to come to our place?"

"Not me, thanks," said Jackie. "I've seen a bit tonight. Think I'll go out with Bev and pretend I haven't."

The Doctor grinned.

"'Sides," said Jackie, sternly, "didn't anyone ever tell you that thirteen-year-olds are NOT allowed to wear that much make up?"

* * *

Rose and Jackie decided to go a few rounds over Rose's makeup, so the Doctor wandered into the kitchen, after sternly admonishing them to take it outside so as not to wake Jack.

What was comfort food on the Boeshane Peninsula? the Doctor wondered. The TARDIS could have told him, but he was in Jackie Tyler's kitchen, so that was out.

A few minutes of rifling around, and he found all the makings of a decent noodle soup with chicken and, if he remembered correctly, that was at least comfort food in America and Jack was very American, sort of.

He followed the recipe from memory - very handy, being a genius - and soon had the soup stock started. By the time Rose and Jackie came back in with Mickey, he was neatly cutting up the cooked chicken for the soup.

"What?" he said, when Rose came in and stared at him boldly.

"Nothing," she said, and went to wash her face. Evidentally, Jackie had won.

Mickey came in and helped him put together some grilled cheese sandwiches to go with the soup. Jackie followed a few minutes later, looked at them for several minutes, and walked back out, humming the theme to the Twilight Zone.

Jack woke at last about the time the soup was ready. He came in, tossle-headed and yawning and walked straight up to Mickey, then held up his little arms. Mickey, quite surprised, picked him up and Jack kissed him on the cheek. "Thanks," said the little boy. "I'd give you a proper kiss, but you'll have to wait 'til I'm older."

Mickey rolled his eyes, set the boy down in a chair and went to wash his own face.

The Doctor laughed. "Feeling better?" he asked.

"Yeah," he said, sheepishly. "Sorry about that."

"No worries," the Doctor said. "How about some soup?"

"Oooh," Jack exclaimed, as excited as any kid his apparent age. "I love soup!"

The Doctor nodded, came over, and fished out his comb. A few deft gestures and he had Jack's hair straight again. The boy smirked at him and the Doctor shook his head. "Soup's on," he called out, and waited for the rest to arrive.

* * *

They headed back for the TARDIS after dinner, the Doctor carrying Rose this time, as she had fallen asleep on the sofa.

Jackie stopped him at the door. "I know you'll take care of them," she said softly, kindly. "Take care of yourself, too."

"Thanks, Jackie," the Doctor replied quietly, shifting Rose carefully so as not to disturb her.

"I'd've never thought..." Jackie smiled and patted Jack's head. "You know, little man," she said to the tiny Captain, "if it wasn't for your naughty mouth, I wouldn't mind you for a grandchild."

Jack smiled at her, straightening his little sailor suit and trying to look dignified. "Thank you," he said. "I hope I'll see you again." He winked outrageously and hugged her around the waist.

Jackie laughed at him. "Look after my girl," she told him.

"From a distance," the Doctor added.

Jack grinned, opened the door, and stepped out onto the balcony.

"Tell Mickey thanks from me," the Doctor said kindly.

"He'll appreciate it." Jackie laughed softly, stood on her toes, and kissed his cheek.

For that single instant, the Doctor could see quite clearly her connection to his Rose. "Thanks," he said, softly. "We'll be back by in a few weeks."

"Good, I wanna see the photos."

He shook his head and hugged Rose closer, then carried her out into the evening twilight.

* * *

The night air woke her, but she didn't want to get down. "Mickey went down the pub, then?"

"Yeah," the Doctor said with a wry grin. "Something about chicken soup being a bit domestic for him."

Rose snorted and Jack giggled and the Doctor felt more alive than he had in months.

* * *

They watched Star Wars, one of the Doctor's personal favorites. "I love this scene," he told them, pausing the DVD on the Tatooine sunset. "It's brilliant. And no, I haven't taken Lucas to see a binary sunset, so I've no idea how he got it so right."

"You love sunsets all around, don't you?" she asked, curled up at his side in her little night dress.

"Beautiful things," he agreed.

"Can I ask a question?" Jack said some time later.

"Yeah?" said Rose.

"Didn't they know when they made this thing that you can't hear that stuff in space?"

Rose grinned. "Yeah, just, you can't have a cowboy movie without the guns blazing."

"Oh," said Jack. He was silent for a few minutes, but they caught him watching the screen covetously. He grinned and gestured. "I want one of those."

"Lemme guess," said the Doctor. "Han's blaster?"

"That, too," Jack agreed. Then, his eyes lit up. "I want a light saber."

The Doctor grinned. "Don't we all."

"Nah, you'd just get your hand cut off in a sword fight," said Jack.

Rose laughed.

"Tell you what, Captain," said the Doctor. "When you're back to normal, you're on."

"Why not now?" Jack demanded indignantly.

The Doctor just looked at him and shook his head.

* * *

The Doctor tucked Jack into bed some hours later. "Get some sleep, Captain, and tomorrow, this'll all be a bad dream." He kissed the boy on the forehead and went to put out the light.

Jack sighed and beamed at him. "Think I'll just stay this size," he said. "How else am I ever gonna get you to kiss me?"

The Doctor laughed. "Buy me a drink, first," he reminded the small flirt.

Jack yawned. "When you lose the sword fight," he said softly.

The Doctor brushed a hand over the small, dimpled cheek. "I'll see you in the morning."

"Night, Doctor," Jack said. "You were... fantastic."

* * *

Rose was waiting for him in the corridor. "Do I need to tuck you in, too?"

"Sure," she replied with a wistful little smile.

"Ok, c'mon."

"I'm not tired yet," she said and followed him down the corridor. "Read me a story?"

He grinned and shoved open the door to her room. "All right."

Rose climbed up into her bed and the Doctor tucked the covers up around her chin.

"Will I remember all this?" she asked.

"It'll be very hazy," he said. "Changes your body will go through in the night, it'll wipe out most of the short term."

"Then, I'm sorry for being such a pain in the arse."

"You were fantastic, Rose," he replied sincerely.

"You were domestic, Doctor," she teased back. Then, her small face sobered and she studied him with a serious expression, reaching for his hand. "It was amazing." She smiled up at him, shyly, then. "But you're not mad?"

"No, not at all. You're right, it was almost amazing."

"Do you still love me, then?" she asked sleepily.

He looked deep into her eyes, saw there the reflections of things that could never be, taxies and street corners at two am, houses with curtains. A little girl with silver blue eyes, dark hair, and Rose's glowing smile. A little boy with golden curls and deep, dark, stormy eyes. "'Course I do," he admitted softly.

"Good then." She yawned. "Love you, too."

"I know." He patted her small hands, then settled into his chair next to her bed. He picked up a book from her bedside table and grinned at it. Well, why not.

_"Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of Number 4, Privet Drive, were proud to say they were perfectly normal, thank you very much..."_


End file.
